I received a tip yesterday with proof that OCZ's Everest controller was actually a Marvell 88SS9174 controller (the same controller used in Crucial's m4, Intel's SSD 510, etc...) with a custom Indilinx firmware. After a bit of digging, it turns out that this is indeed the case (OCZ confirmed it to me earlier today). Although OCZ is working on non-Marvell based solutions, the Everest 1 (Octane) and indeed the Everest 2 (Vertex 4) are both based on Marvell hardware. The firmware is entirely Indilinx's own development, but the hardware is from Marvell. The hardware implementation isn't completely identical as OCZ claims its solutions run at higher clock speeds than the standard off-the-shelf Marvell components.
This doesn't really change anything but it does explain how...